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ENMU-Ruidoso's Orozco attends inaugural Latino Studies Conference

By staff reports

Posted:
07/29/2014 05:22:38 PM MDT

Dr. Cynthia Orozco, chair of the History, Humanities, and Social Sciences at ENMU-Ruidoso, presented on the "Rise of Chicana Studies in the 1980s," recently at a conference which has established the first major Latina/Latino Studies organization. (Courtesy)

Dr. Cynthia E. Orozco recently attended a conference that has established the first major Latina/Latino Studies organization. Orozco, chair of the History, Humanities, and Social Sciences at ENMU-Ruidoso, presented on the "Rise of Chicana Studies in the 1980s."

Orozco was a founder of the Chicana Caucus in the National Association for Chicano Studies in 1983, coordinator of the Women's Unit within the UCLA Chicano Studies Research Center, and a historian for a Chicana/Latina academic organization. Orozco was a graduate student in history at UCLA in the 1980s.

Mexican American Studies programs began in the late 1960s. Women Studies within these programs and departments began in the 1980s. Latino Studies initially focused on Mexican Americans, Cubans, and Puerto Ricans. Today Latino Studies also includes the new immigrants from Honduras, Guatemala, and El Salvador. Latino Studies first emerged in the Midwest but can now be found all across the US including the South and New Mexico.